


there are no seasons in space

by heartslogos



Series: i'd rather fall among the stars [1]
Category: Warframe
Genre: F/M, i dont know how to tag this honestly, i guess, semi-sentient warframes, two tenno in love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-14
Updated: 2017-05-14
Packaged: 2018-10-31 21:37:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,319
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10907949
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/heartslogos/pseuds/heartslogos
Summary: “You are all strong,” Margulis tells them. They do not say anything back because half of them are muzzled, a good quarter of them are drugged, and the rest of them are smart enough to know that with the Orokin - Margulis is not Orokin in the way the rest are - watching they should preserve whatever secrets of speech they have left. “But you are children. And it is not the role of children to be strong.”It is a sweet sentiment.But they are not children.





	there are no seasons in space

**Author's Note:**

  * For [suspectmind](https://archiveofourown.org/users/suspectmind/gifts).



When they first meet, Kore is still firmly _Kore_. She does not yet know she will lose this part of her, albeit - in the very, _very_ long run - temporarily. She does not realize what this name will later mean, how it will shape her. How she will shape _it_.

Kore does not remember her mother or her father, at this point in her story - where her story truly begins - they are no longer relevant.

She remembers that, of this, she feels nothing. Later - when later is the same later of the shaping of names and farther beyond that - she will wonder if this makes her a bad person.

In truth, the Kore that could have, must have, should have, mourned her parents and their mad passing has long been blotted out and scabbed over. That Kore is no longer the same as the Kore that notices him - his name, then, was Judge - for the first time.

They are all children in appearance, and they are quickly becoming something else in soul. Kore believes in souls. It is not civilized or acceptable to believe in souls in this day and age, but she does.

In body they are children - all of them are frightened of the horrors they’ve been forced to fight. They are all deeply disturbed and rattled at what their parents, their guardians, have become and are - in turn - forcing _them_ to become.

They are not becoming adults. They are not _maturing_. Kore knows this because she does not think that the things they are doing here, the crude forms of structure and hierarchy that they are carving out of each other can be considered something adults would do.

Kore feels it inside of herself as well. This change, this shift. It bubbles inside of her, electric - like the fizzy-cola and the white tablets they use to clean their water. And with every bubble burst it feels like she’s being scorched inside out - just like how she sometimes imagines the main thrusters feel when the engines get pushed too hard.

She is not looking at him. She is looking at the cramped and dark walls and willing herself to push everything down, to compact it like the cubes of waste this ship - when it was still functioning and run by adults - would send out every other day.

No one is exactly looking at each other. No one really looks at each other anymore. They stay together, but it’s something in the off kilter thing they’re becoming. No one is sure. No one is steady.

Their minds are wobbling - space as you enter warp, blending and smearing into itself.

She can hear the sounds of some of the younger children breaking, crying.

They are not making a fair hierarchy. The older ones, the stronger and bolder and smarter ones, know this. The younger ones feel the brunt of it.

The rest of them focus on not snapping.

Judge, having missed this memo, snaps today.

Kore looks up - many of the others clustered around her look up as well - when they scent violence. After the adults, the smell of violence has become a tangible thing. Hostility. An indescribable taste at the back of her mouth, just past the ridges of the roof of her mouth and before the dip of her throat.

Judge’s bared teeth are bright under the harsh artificial lighting, brighter still against his dark skin as he slugs a taller boy straight in the stomach. Kore stares - all of them stare - as the fight breaks out.

Judge is a narrow, unremarkable boy. The only thing remarkable, perhaps, is that he doesn’t go down so easily when hit. The young ones he was defending are no longer crying, but staring like the rest of them.

It’s over soon enough. There’s no clear winner in that both are still standing, Judge looking the worst of it, but the older boy retreats to the crowd of other older children.

His name is Judge, and the only reason Kore knows this is because he’s one of the few who still have their name labels sewn onto the breast of his suit. Most of them have torn theirs off.

Or had them torn off.

Kore’s suit - where her own name should be - is ripped, the internal insulation and biometrics wiring exposed in a ragged, imperfect rectangle.

His name is Judge, and he limps off to lean against a bare patch of wall to lick his wounds in silence.

-

The tests are brutal. The tests are violent.

The test are almost familiar.

What is not familiar is Margulis and the way she looks at them.

There’s over a hundred of them - they call them Void demons.

Kore doesn’t care what they are called, just that they are no longer packed into the sealed city they had made in the ship. Kore does not care much about anything, any more.

She does not see so many of the other children anymore. They are kept isolated. She thinks that the Orokin mean this to weaken them. To keep them unbalanced and submissive.

Kore thinks that the Orokin have become quite foolish in the time she has not been around to watch the changes of the Empire. She does not say this. She does not say much of anything.

She does not rebel. She has no reason to. Not yet. Kore is waiting for it. But for now, it suits her well enough to be tested and then locked into her cell. She is docile enough. They do not drug her outside of testing. They do not beat her. They do not watch her and touch her overly outside of the tests and examinations.

This is not the same for the rest of the children. She knows this because -

Because she can feel it.

She became aware of it about three rotation cycles after they are pulled from the womb of their self-created fortress, hissing and half-feral.

She can feel, distantly, almost separately from herself, all the others from the Zariman Ten Zero who are in semi-proximity to her. She does not feel them with her body, but with something in her head, underneath her skin. It is like the taste of hostility, but it is not a taste, but a sort of hum mixed between her skin and her nerves. It is not a physical feeling. It is something in the thing Kore thinks of as a soul.

Kore is no longer sure what a soul is, but she thinks that she is feeling with it.

She can feel the unease of her fellow - what the Orokin have begun to name _\- tenno_.

A distant part of her rolls her eyes at the lack of creativity of this name. Tenno.

But the word _children_ does not seem right. _Void beast_ is too crude.

Tenno will have to do.

Kore knows that there are tenno who resist the Orokin. They are drugged. Their tests are harder. They are beaten. There are things done to them. Terrible things. Vicious things.

Adult things, in the same way the adults became on the ship. Macabre things.

Kore waits.

The only one to touch them without violence is Margulis. Kore does not like to be touched. She does not like many things.

But she can tolerate Margulis.

When Kore thinks about Margulis, she vaguely remembers a time before the Void jump. Kore vaguely remembers that she did have a mother and a father, and that they were not just adults. They were something more than that.

After those vague impressions though, Kore swiftly cuts off all attempts at remembrance.

Kore knows what she did. Kore knows what they all did. She does not need to make it harder on herself.

To this effect, she does not consider the fate of her fellow tenno when she has to worry about her own.

“You are all strong,” Margulis tells them. They do not say anything back because half of them are muzzled, a good quarter of them are drugged, and the rest of them are smart enough to know that with the Orokin - Margulis is not Orokin in the way the rest are - watching they should preserve whatever secrets of speech they have left. “But you are children. And it is not the role of children to be strong.”

It is a sweet sentiment.

But they are not children.

Kore glances at the faces of kin.

They have not been children for a long time.

-

Only a few of the tenno are fortunate enough - useful enough - to have custom frames built for them.

The rest of the tenno make do with whichever they are assigned to.

Kore has neither a particularly special gift revealed to her by the Void, nor a particular talent. Kore is, as Kore has always been, herself and contained.

They assign her, at first, to an Excalibur squadron. Most everyone is an Excalibur, except for the few who have shown aptitude for Mag units and Rhino units. But Mag and Rhino units are hard to produce, so most of the tenno are Excalibur.

Kore knows that a few other tenno have been pulled aside for research. She has no doubt that more frame models will be made soon.

Excalibur is good enough, she supposes - she has no frame of reference to compare it to. She gets used to her Excalibur frame.

But she can tell it was not made of her.

This is fine for the most part.

Except one mission where it is not fine, and either she fails to keep up with her frame or her frame fails to keep up with her, and she goes dark.

Kore wakes up one hundred and eighty rotation cycles later, the top of her Somatic pod frozen. Her arms are weak, but she bangs her hand against it.

And again. And again. And again. And again, until someone comes to open it.

The researcher stares at her in utter bewilderment.

“Excalibur-0013,” She says, “You were dead.”

Margulis is dead. Kore’s parents are dead.

Kore looks back into the researcher’s eyes, “Not anymore.”

Sometimes the researchers give their favorite tenno names aside from their frame numbers. Frame numbers were getting hard to keep track of - what with the tenno being moved through the increasing variety of frames.

The tenno do not get to keep their real names. Those are the names for Orokin.

They are not Orokin.

The research team in charge of Kore’s group of Somatic pods begins to refer to her as Persephone.

Like everything else, it does not quite fit. But Kore does not care enough to argue. It does not shackle her enough to protest.

It is better than Excalibur-0013.

-

She is assigned to an Ember frame next. Ember-0942.

This she is not so bad at. It feels a little more comfortable in a different way than her Excalibur frame did. It is still not a frame meant for her - she recoils with every hit her frame takes, and the frame just doesn’t move fast enough or hold its ground enough for her. Most importantly, the frame doesn’t _hit_ hard enough.

But Persephone enjoys the roar of flames and the way she can feel her powers being channeled through the frame. She likes the feel of her energy pooling out across the surfaces of the astroids and ship tiles, erupting whenever it finds another body and screaming across it in heat.

Persephone does very well in the Ember units. As an exterminator.

Her handlers quickly learn to pull her off of reconnaissance and defense patrols. She does not have the patience to gather information quietly, nor the skill, and she gets too absorbed in a fight to actually guard her cargo.

But she is very, _very_ good at hunting.

Her handlers quietly discuss moving her to one of the new, experimental Ivara frames.

Persephone is mostly sent out with other Ember units, a few Rhino frames, and the occasional test frame to see how they handle. Most recent of those test frames was an Oberon frame that the designers quickly pulled out of field testing for a better configuration.

On one of her missions, she is assigned to work with a Mag unit to hijack a cargo load of fuel from a Sentient controlled outpost.

This is most displeasing.

As her frame is locked into the cargo holder for deployment she feels the Mag unit being loaded across from her. Persephone tentatively feels out towards it and feels it reach back.

It is not until they are twenty minutes into the operation when she realizes that she is familiar with the tenno behind this Mag unit.

It is in the way this Mag unit, when caught in a close brawl, refuses to go down even though it is losing quite clearly. It is in the way this Mag unit breaks from established routine form and starts to slug it out with the Sentient controlled machine.

A name tickles the back of her head, tracing down both her and her Ember unit’s spine.

She pushes it down like so much unnecessary waste and goes to support her partner. Persephone snaps the machine’s head clear off and throws it hard enough that it takes out the camera of a nearby turret.

Frames do not have mouths. Tools do not talk.

She looks into the Mag unit’s optic camera and wills something across.

 _I remember you_.

Frames do not have mouths. It is more effective to build no mouth rather than to design a muzzle.

They are not children.

-

The frames get progressively more flamboyant, as to reflect the beauty of the Orokin Empire and the new traction they are gaining in this war.

The tenno are forever hidden away in their pods with their handlers their only witnesses. But the handlers, when presenting the tenno to their superiors, like for their tools to look as good as the rest of their arsenal.

The metal is strange to her, a little constricting about the ears. But she thinks it is better than the spike that goes through the nose bridge of the tenno in the pod next to her. He does not seem to particularly mind it, and when he looks at the cuffs that line her ears he grimaces.

“I have one hole,” He says in a low voice to her once, “Two if you count entry and exit. _Your entire ear is one long rip_.”

“It’s only four holes per ear,” Persephone replied, voice husky with disuse.

For inspection, her hair is always perfectly trimmed and brushed.

None of the tenno have aged since the years after leaving the Zariman, and their minds are still not adults. They are not children. They are other.

Some handlers seem to understand this distinction and treat them as such. Whether this means those handlers treat them as semi-feral Earth-beasts to be observed carefully for the slightest twitch, or a domesticated genetic mess-pet like a Kavat or Kubrow to be shown off and paraded varies.

There are the occasional handlers who see them as - a different sort of pet.

There has only been one handler like that _once_ assigned to Persephone’s pod station and they were quickly relieved from duty.

Persephone does not like to be touched. She will not tolerate the possibility of someone who is too drunk on power to realize that. She will not passively wait for an attempt.

The other tenno, since then - although it has been _years_ of them sleeping and fighting and training and testing with each other in this station - have grown to almost _huddle_ together since then. A new sort of bond.

And because of her role in evicting their unwelcome handler - more unwelcome, at least, than the rest - she has unofficially become the steady thing they lean on.

“This is the one?” A man of some Importance - she knows this because he is attended by many glittering slaves - looks her over once.

Persephone has not seen herself in years. She does not know what she looks like nor does she particularly care. She does not bristle under those eyes. He is not worth that. Let him see.

Persephone is, as always, _herself_.

“Yes, Executor Ballas.”

That name pings in all of the tenno’s minds and Persephone finds herself examining the man again. Margulis found this man worthy. This man destroyed Margulis.

This man made their frames.

Ballas looks at her, giving cursory glances at the other three tenno standing at attention with her, and then back at her.

“What is it’s call sign?” He jerks his chin at her.

Persephone feels something familiar lick up the back of her throat, hissing and spitting and _sweet_. Cola.

“Ember-0942, before that an old Excalibur-0013. From the original blueprint designs.”

“One of the lost Excalibur units?”

“Yes, Executor.”

Ballas’ eyes are now appraising. Persephone does not flinch.

“We call her Persephone,” The handler standing close to her, holding the long metal rod attached the thick collar around her neck rests a tentative hand - a _display_ \- on her head. Persephone resists the profound urge to snap and push it off. “She came back after two seasons.”

Ballas’ eyebrows raise, “You waste humor on the tenno. It is appropriate. It will do. I will take it. Deliver it to my labs.”

A low pang of fear thuds in her belly and the handler immediately tugs her by the collar towards cargo loading.

Persephone looks into the eyes of her tenno and wishes she knew their names.

And with a cold shock to the small of her back -

She wishes she knew what to tell them as hers.

-

Executor Ballas is not as she first feared.

Her containment unit in his laboratory is - is a definite change from the cold, sterile, plain unit that she was assigned to when not in her pod.

There is a bed. It takes her a few minutes to remember the word. _Bed_.

There is a window. It is small, about the size of her two hands put side by side. But it is a window that shows _sky_ because they are on a planet, and not in space.

The air is not recycled.

There are walls and a door, not bars and see-through electro-barriers.

There is nothing else, but this is more than Persephone has had in a very, very long time. Possibly ever. She does not remember what she had _before_.

Ballas does not come to her personally, and none of his assistance ever touch her outside of the  clinical and scientific touches of people learning about their new asset.

“You are now my tenno,” Ballas tells her in one of the few conversations he deigns to have with his new weapon, “You must _shine_.”

His eyes appraise her again, and this time with a wave of his hand assistants and slaves bring forward new suits.

“Your call sign is _Persephone_.” Ballas rubs his chin, “With your coloring and what I can see of your temperament, it is suitable.”

Persephone does not know what  he means by coloring but she certainly understands her own temper.

Her new link-suits are pale green and cream. They look delicate.

She despises them immediately.

But Ballas nods in approval and that is that.

The real purpose for Ballas’ acquisition of her is revealed two weeks later, after many tests and many examinations.

“She is _Saryn_ ,” Ballas says, sounding near reverential as he touches the empty frame’s white arm, stroking almost _lovingly_ up to the strange whispering growths on its shoulder. He cups Saryn’s head between his hands, gazing into the black and uncaring optic area. “And she will reclaim the ruin.”

His voice sharpens as he turns to her.

“She is a poison, a disease, a pestilence. She is unshakeable, undeniable. She is ravenous and she is merciless. Reports show that you do reasonably well with both the Excalibur and Ember frames. But it is not a perfect fit. But credit is due where it is due. You were a pilot of the early Exalibur units, before we understood calibration and how to train your kind properly. You did exceptionally well handling a unit that had not been configured for you, a unit that by all means was obsolete before it was even finished being built. And you have among the highest statistics recorded for an Ember unit of such a late batch.”

Ballas seems to hum and nod to himself, looking her over.

“The first of the Saryn frames have begun to be dispatched for testing among the lesser battlefronts. But _you_ , I will dispatch to Earth.”

Persephone has never been to _Earth_. She can’t help the widening of her eyes, the quickening of her pulse.

A wave of forgotten _want_.

“This mission is purely for _test_ purposes,” Ballas continues, seemingly unconsciously stroking the frame’s throat with his free hand as his gaze bores into her, “You will fight the Infested on Earth. Let us see what a mix of Excalibur level melee combat training and Ember widespread attacks handles. Do you understand, Tenno?”

She nods.

“I said,” Ballas’ voice drops, “Do you understand, Tenno?”

She realizes he wants her to speak.

A wave of something else swells in her - _resentment_. She is no Kubrow to bark when you please.

“Yes,” Her mouth creaks open, the words rasping out of her like dry air through a rattling filtration unit. And when he continues to stare down at her - “Yes, _Master_.”

Ballas turns away from her then, content.

As she is escorted away she hears him whisper, “Soon, Margulis. _Soon, the blue will be yours again_.”

-

Saryn. Saryn. _Saryn_.

Persephone does not have the words for _Saryn_.

She knows Saryn was not made _for her_ , Saryn was not based _on her_. But it _feels like it_.

Ballas’ voice is in her head as she lands, sword ready as she scans the area for Infested.

Saryn fights like a dream. With every reach of her hand, with every burst of power, Persephone feels something of that simmering and fizzing pressure inside of her ease off. She feels the heat of Ember coating her, building and building and building and _bursting out_ in a mass of toxic gas that she watches as it _eats_ at flesh and bone alike.

The sounds of the wild things of Earth and the hissing of flesh and the towering trees and dark muddy pools around her make her heart pound. Saryn’s heart. Her heart. _Both_.

Ballas whispers things under his breath, half to Saryn - not Persephone - and half to himself.

She blots him out, pushes his voice down and away like the garbage it is.

The sword feels as right in these hands as it ever did - better even, than in Excalibur’s. Excalibur wielded the sword like it was part of the unit, like the sword was built into the hand. For some, she supposes, that is a good thing.

But Persephone is no sword.

Saryn holds the sword like the weapon it is - but not a part of the frame. The sword is disposable.

The danger is inside.

Saryn’s power bursts out of her in powerful waves and razing clouds.

Persephone, for all that she loathes the Orokin and all that they touch, adores _this_.

-

She does not trust the Lotus.

She does not trust that she cannot remember anything. Her own name seems strange to her. Persephone.

She does not trust the Lotus. But there are unmistakeable facts before her that lead her to listening to the Lotus rather than striking off on her own.

The Grineer are wretched creatures. The Corpus are pathetic leeches.

And the things of the Void are disturbing.

The Infested are - the Infested are what they are.

Persephone would infinitely rather deal with _these_ than with anything else. The Lotus has connections. The Lotus leads her to other War Frames.

Her cephalon assures her that all is well. Persephone has no doubt that to the cephalon this is true.

War Frames cannot talk. She has no way of voicing the concerns that run through her head. She wonders if this is on purpose.

She supposes that this is fine. She has a sword. She is slowly awakening to the powers of what the Orbiter’s data base tells her belongs to _Excalibur_.

It is unwieldily, but she learns it well enough. It takes time. She fumbles. Excalibur falters. But they learn.

They learn enough and slowly gain enough experience that the Lotus nudges her in the direction of higher ranking targets, more difficult missions and tasks. Hostage rescues, infiltration, hijacking, decoy runs.

Persephone has nothing else to do. So she does. And she finds some interesting things in the process.

She gets a Kubrow, for one thing. Some Sentinels.

They don’t talk either - they don’t have mouths. Her Kubrow _do_ have mouths, but for the most part they are quiet, barking for play and to warn her of danger, but otherwise not particularly upset by her lack of ability to actually give them orders.

She finds blueprints for other frames. She finds other weapons.

Persephone experiments, wondering if it’s possible to find something that feels more - right?

But how can something be _more_ right? Excalibur is her. She is Excalibur.

Distantly she wonders - what that means. How is she capable of moving between the frames? What is she? Her cephalon refers to her as _operator_ but - but what does _that_ mean?

The answer to that is something she shies away from, not yet ready to handle.

But she does know this - she is not exactly her War Frame. She is something separate. A soul. Yes. A soul.

Whatever a soul is.

And her soul - whatever her soul is - wears different frames better than others. In a strange way, in the same way she is fond of her Kubrow and her Sentinels, she is attached to her frames. It seems strange but she sometimes feels that they are attached to her similarly. It is, most likely, her idle imagination.

She watches from her fresh out of maintenance and upgrade Valkyr frame as her Oberon frame is stowed into the Orbiter’s armory. She will need more Frame storage slots soon. She’s slowly been finding the blueprints for a War Frame design called _Saryn_ as she clears out Grineer on Sedna.

-

Persephone knows she must be right. Her soul - whatever it is - feels the frames differently.

Saryn fits so _well_. Saryn feels - Saryn feels like _her_. Like she was _meant_ to be in Saryn all along.

Persephone recognizes the need for there to be different tools, different methods, for different situations - Oberon when she’s guarding cargo on Earth, Ember when she’s running across Mars to destroy a generator as quickly as possible, Valkyr to catch and wrangle Corpus.

But _Saryn -_ Persephone never wants to leave Saryn.

And Saryn, she thinks, doesn’t want Persephone to leave her, either.

There are frames that Persephone is passable with.

Banshee is quiet enough for when Persephone needs to snipe from afar, but Persephone’s thoughts echo back at her and her mind buzzes too lowly. Something about Banshee makes her uneasy, unsettled - uncomfortable.

Rhino does its best to protect her, but the frame moves too slowly to do what she wants and gets confused in the process. Rhino is almost impossible for her.

Mag is, overall, too fragile for Persephone’s tastes. Powerful, yes, but too fragile.

And Nyx -

She appreciates the Nyx frame. But for the few cycles she was Nyx it made her sick beyond compare. Persephone was barely able to fully awaken her Nyx frame before she sent it for disassembly. She regrets it, in the same way she feels a small pang of guilt whenever she sends one of her frames to storage - but worse because she _didn’t want Nyx around at all_. But it wasn’t a good - or even tolerable - fit.

Valkyr is exhilarating - Persephone feels like she’s constantly running, on edge, heart pounding as Valkyr. But it wears down on her, makes her anxious. Paranoid. Twitchy and volatile.

Excalibur and Ember are the closest she has to being even keel but one falls too much on the melee side and the other too much on the wide shot.

Saryn is a perfect mix between the two - powerful in close combat but also capable of taking out her opponents at a distance.

-

Her name is not Persephone.

The memory digs itself up as she examines her hands - _Operator, this is why she is an Operator, and not a Warframe. She Operates the warframe_. They are small hands. They are not the same hands of her Saryn, or her Oberon, or even of her Mag frame. They are small hands.

Flesh hands.

Or at least, more flesh than that of a Warframe.

The Lotus watches her, patient in a way that stirs up more memories from the mud and muck Persephone had kept pushed down and away for so long.

They are still waste. They are still baggage. But now she actually has to sort through that mess in the dark to find something to hold onto.

Her Saryn unit is kneeling next to her.

Persephone is certain she is not imagining it when the frame’s head subtly tilts towards her, blank face gazing at the Lotus. The image is similar to that of one of her Kubrow, ears laid back, teeth bared, ready to lunge but not quite there.

“You are not my mother,” Persephone says - listening to the sound of her - _her own! Her very own!_ \- voice. It does not sound like the way it sounds in her head.

The Lotus nods, “I understand. I do not wish to replace the memories you have of your parents.”

Persephone looks at where the Lotus’ eyes should probably be if she has any, “I am not _your_ child.”

The Lotus seems to soften with the rebuke, “But you are a child.”

Persephone stares at her curling and uncurling her fingers - mesmerized by the feel of it. Faintly she feels something like a curious tilt of the head, amusement, in the direction of Saryn, and - and somewhere else on the ship, _laughter_.

“I am Persephone,” It is not exactly right, but the truth of her name can be found later. She is in no rush.

She just unleashed what felt like three Orbiter’s worth of engine power onto the Stalker and a sentient.

She is no child.

-

If Saryn was like a house she had discovered and made her own, Saryn _Prime_ is a _home_ she has just returned to after a long time away.

Or at least, she’s what Persephone imagines to be like a home.

Saryn Prime folds over her, warmly, securely, and even though Persephone does try out other frames - Titania, difficult to master but incredibly fun, Nekros, Hyroid, Frost - Saryn Prime is the one she wants to rest herself in.

She thinks that the Lotus offers her Saryn Prime as a way to earn Persephone forgiveness.

("No more secrets. What else are you hiding? What else have you not told me?"

"There are no more secrets, Persephone. This, I promise you. You have uncovered all of mine, the ones that touch upon you and the Tenno. If there are more secrets they are unknown to me as well. Forgive me, I only wanted to protect you."

Persephone restrained herself from saying, you wanted to have me. Not a Margulis, not quite a Ballas. Still a Master.)

It is a good gesture, but Persephone forgives easily enough. Most things do not warrant the energy of her extended feelings at all. The Lotus has never been someone capable of reaching that place in her.

It's the forgetting part that causes trouble.

Mostly, Persephone uses her newfound freedom - separation - to puzzle out what this means for her, if she is not her frame and they are not her. With certainty and precision of boundaries.

Persephone has not yet uncovered the memory of her name - though she has reluctantly and carefully unearthed a few memories in the safety of her ship, with her slowly growing menagerie of Kubrow - now _Kavat_ \- and Sentinels supporting her.

She hugs her long-suffering Kavat to her chest as she feels the memory of war, of her first somatic link with an Excalibur unit.

Persephone trips onto the memory of her first ever transference with a Saryn unit - a Saryn _Prime_ unit - and winds up a boneless puddle on the floor, staring at the Orbiter ceiling. Every nerve in her body fires and her mind blanks out in what can only be described as _euphoria_. She only really pulls herself back to the present when two of her Kubrow worry their muzzles into her face, whining and pawing at the ground.

(At least this explains how her pack always knows it's her despite her frame changes. They knew there was someone else behind the eyes before she did.)

She remembers Margulis in glimpses. People she places the title of _Handlers_ to.

Ballas, a man named Ballas in gold watching her with greedy, fanatical eyes. This memory has her pulling Rhino out of storage with her bare Tenno hands, having him sit for her and pull her into his arms.

Rhino is slow and Rhino is clumsy, but he has never failed to make her feel _safe_. Surrounded. Her Carrier Sentinel shoves itself into her arms as she curls up in Rhino’s, whirring and humming as the other Sentinels crowd out the larger Kubrow and Kavat to try and understand what’s wrong with her.

She isn’t sure if it’s _her_ or _Rhino_ that decides to curl up; she just knows that Rhino’s arms rise to hold her close and his legs raise up a little to roll her into the thick and broad groove of his pelvis and torso.

She does not remember the other Tenno. Not much, at least.

-

The Lotus had told her to hide the secret of the Dream. She did not have to tell Persephone why.

But she wonders whenever she is partnered with one - _do you know me? Do you know your own face? Do I know you? Did we know each other before? Are you awake?_

It is, for the most part, a curiosity that she can push aside. It doesn't not truly matter to her.

She still doesn't remember any other children if the Zariman, why would any remember her?

-

It is a standard procedure - get in, defend the cryopod, wait for the sleeping Tenno to reconnect, lay down cover fire as the Lotus guides the newly awakened Tenno through rediscovering how to move and fight, and escort the awakened Frame to safety.

She’s done it many times before.

It’s all to the book - as much as anything is to the hypothetical book - until the Frame wakes up and tumbles out of cryo.

This one is a Mag.

Mags, Volts, and Excaliburs are the oldest and most widespread frames. Easy to make, easy to churn out. That’s why all the cryopods have them.

This one is a Mag.

This one is a Mag, and the way the Mag moves seems familiar. The glitter of purpose and power in this Mag sinks a razor wire straight into the wastes of Persephone’s memory and tangles around something, pulling at it. Not freeing whatever it is. It just snags, pulling and irritating and upsetting her.

Her Saryn frame feels it, and the white tendrils of her shoulder and head seem to undulate and writhe in response.

When the Mag successfully succeeds in a _Pull_ maneuver it lodges the memory of a sound free from her.

_A fist._

A name tag.

A boy.

Persephone rushes out of Earth as fast as possible - she may go a little too fast for the Mag to keep up, but Persephone clears most of the Grineer out that the Mag doesn’t have much to worry about aside from the stray feral animal here and there. As soon as the Mag is safely in their newly assigned Orbiter, Persephone climbs into her own.

“Ordis,” She rasps through her own mouth, cutting transference as she feels the Orbiter’s satellite ship thrust off from Earth to return to the main ship, “Ordis. Get us out of here.”

“Operator? What’s wrong? Your bio-signature readings are - “

“ _Get me out of here!_ ”

-

Persephone jiggles the memory like a loose tooth for what feels like ages as Ordis keeps them at a respectable orbit around Neptune. Ordis doesn’t ask questions - or at least, he stops when he realizes she won’t answer, is in no place to answer - and she huddles up on the floor of the transference room, lying in Saryn’s lap, head cushioned on the strange growth on Saryn’s upper thigh as Saryn runs her hand through Persephone’s hair.

She hails the Lotus when even her ever tolerant and forgiving Kubrow start to look reproachful of her sulking.

“Is he alright?” Persephone asks.

“Persephone, I was beginning to get worried,” The Lotus says, not answering her question. “Your coms have been quiet - Ordis sent me a transmission that you were unwell. What troubles you?”

“Is Judge alright?” She asks again. “I know him. I knew him - I remember him. Did you know that? Did you know I would? More secrets? What else? You said no more.”

 _Liar_.

The Lotus seems stunned, “You know Hades?”

“Hades?”

“His call sign, during the War,” The Lotus explains. “As yours is Persephone.”

“Hades,” Persephone repeats. “I remember him.”

She does not need to explain why this is important.

She does not know her own name. She knows his.

The Lotus is contemplative and silent. Persephone runs her thumbs over one of her Djinn’s wings, feelings the soft flesh moving around over hard but flexible - whatever it is that makes up Djinn’s frame.

“Here are the addresses for Hades’s ship communications and signals,” The Lotus eventually says, voice soft. She does not remind Persephone of what she must not speak of. “He could use some help.”

 _I know_ , Persephone thinks.

-

She’s taken to using her Banshee and Titiania a lot more.

Persephone has _long_ made sure that her usual equipment is silent, but she’s nervous around Judge - Hades. She doesn’t want him to know she’s there. She even starts using her Paris more - she’s shit with bows, but it’s extra insurance that she’s quiet.

It’s not that she’s following him - hovering over him exactly. That’s not how you _learn_. That’s not how you get better. That is not how you survive.

But her curiosity and private sense of selfish protectiveness nudge her to follow after him and check on him occassionally.

He’s got all the earmarks of a freshly awakened Tenno.

Hades is still in his Mag, though he seems to have gotten a better hang of how to use Mag’s abilities. Absolute _shit_ at watching his damn back though.

She picks off three frontiersman that were getting too close to where he was slowly hacking alarms without a single one of them alerting the other. He doesn’t even turn around.

Persephone quickly ducks behind some rocks when he starts to come back and head towards the next data center.

He doesn’t even look in her direction.

Persephone barely resists the urge to go up to him and hit him upside the head. She can feel her Banshee vibrating with disapproval.

This fool is probably more suited to an Excalibur or a Valkyr.

At least maybe then he’d be durable enough to realize exactly _why_ he keeps getting caught.

Another time, she’s shrunken to her smaller Titania form and quickly dispatches some gunners and scorpions by the time he finishes the skirmish on his side. He’s run around the room enough that it would be easy for him to think that he did it himself.

She zips up to the exposed metal beams of the galleon and lands, watching him - now as a Nova - examining the bodies.

Persephone used a blade.

Nova uses fists.

There’s a slightly unsettled look about Hades’ shoulders, but this could be general mission nerves.

  
Titania returns to her normal size just as the electronic doors hiss closed behind Hades as he makes his way to the next room.

She and Titiana, seemingly, both sigh as the alarms go off. _Again_.

-

She has, of course, officially fought at his side.

At first, as Saryn - always.

Later on she began to switch as the situation dictated.

There’s a sort of appraising feeling to Hades whenever their Frames land together on the same drop. As if  he’s slowly learning her like she already knows him.

She wonders if he knows that it’s Persephone. Always Persephone.

She wonders if there’s a way to tell him.

Another thing rattles, shivers, slides inside of her. Not as strongly as the memory of before, but softer. A breeze that signals a gas cloud or a acid storm on the horizon.

Once, Hades - now a Trinity - snags her Saryn by the wrist just before they get onto their respective retrieval ships to go.

They look into each other’s blank, standard faces.

Trinity then releases her wrist and walks to his retrieval ship, stepping onto the footholds and lining Hades’ arms up. Persephone watches - Trinity’s head and optics are turned towards Saryn the entire time.

 _I know you_ , Persephone thinks at the retreating ship of violet and gold. _I know you, too_.

-

She does not tell him of the Dream.

To this effect, she almost slips once in revealing the secret of the difference between _Operator_ and _Warframe_ to him.

They are outnumbered. The alarms are blaring.

Bursas have never been easy for her - no matter how many times she’s faced them.

And the steady hiss of steaming fizzy pressure inside of her that she now knows as Void Energy is reaching a point where she thinks it’s actually _leaking_ out of her.

She wants to unleash it, to force it into a steady beam of fire and blazing light and burn everything. Sear it all. Atomize it. She wants that release and she knows it would help.

Saryn holds her in and she focuses on channelling all of that into a forceful, explosive blast of miasma instead.

It lets off some of the steam. Not all of it.

It’s enough for her to grasp Hades - Mag again - by the back of his syndana and _drag_ him across the ice towards the tunnels that lead out of the ice caves.

-

She’s sleeping - a different sort of sleep than what happens when she’s in transference.

For this, she had dragged out some syndanas from the arsenal and bunched them up on the floor in the center of her Orbiter’s main hub. She’s got Kubrows on all sides, content to doze and kick and chase in their sleep, and Sentinels lowly whirring into rest mode as they tucked themselves into whatever odd spaces between all these bodies they could find. Her Kavat - for these moments - usually curls up a bit away from them, only her tail entering the mix. Silly Kavat.

This is a different sort of sleep and a novelty than transference. It’s for _her_. And it is _precious_.

She’s dozing, having just drifted out of sleep and wondering if she should go back to sleep or actually get up and _do_ something when Ordis speaks -

“An urgent message, Operator,” Ordis announces, sounding flustered, “I told the Lotus that you were resting, in the middle of important bodily maintenance, but she insisted and - “

“ _Persephone_ ,” The Lotus breaks in, face showing up on a holographic screen, “I need you to deploy to Lua. _Now_.”

Persephone is up - her menagerie of creatures scrambling with confusion at the sudden movement -

She does not immediately ask questions. Anything on Lua is bad. There are still other sleepers. They must be in danger -

“It’s Hades,” The Lotus says and Persephone stumbles on her way to her transference chamber, staggering like the wind has been knocked out of her. “It’s his cryopod, Persephone. The Stalker is after it.”

 _Again?_ Persephone marvels with some smaller, more awake part of her.

The rest, that is in _fight,_ mode _snarls_. A sound that she can feel echo from her Frame storage. A ghost of a reaction in her mind.

“He thinks he is ready,” The Lotus continues, “I do not know if he is ready to be woken from the dream. I do not think we should find out who is right. Intercept - prevent the Stalker from luring him out.”

Persephone snarls her answer out.

The Lotus does not need to tell her to protect Hades.

He is all she has.

-

Considering that she was currently sleeping around Neptune - strangely, a very comforting planet to let her ship orbit with its blues and silvery clouds of ice -

(A memory of old Earth, of her deployments and Ballas in her ear. Even his voice wasn’t able to spoil the feeling of moving like a contagion, of the blossoming bursts of clouds that came out of her compacted heart.)

She tells herself that she can’t be surprised that Hades beats her to Lua.

She also tells herself, that she can’t blame herself for not being fast enough when he has such a head start. Even if she knows the ways.

The Lotus had sent her coordinates for Hades’ pod and where it was stored on the moon base.

Saryn navigates the corridors and growths of strange ghostly trees easily. The problem is that Hades - for all that he’s gotten stronger and a little smarter when it comes to _foresight_ \- is that he still hasn’t lost his tendency to rush in blindly.

It has rarely, if ever, helped him.

So Persephone does not make it in time. She does not make it in time to stop him from touching on this deep and soul-rattling thing.

She skids to a stop in the open doors, all of her sensors picking up on the signs of minimal fighting and the Stalker pings on her radar and there he is.

There’s his Mag, there’s both of them, all of them, watching as the plain cryopod comes out of the pools. There’s the Stalker, ready to strike.

She moves before the cryopod has a chance to open.

Persephone abandons finesse - she abandons strategy, she abandons everything that made her an adaptable and decent soldier, a useful tool worthy enough of even Ballas’ ambitions.

Saryn prime hits into the Stalker hard.

She has no teeth to bite, no mouth to snarl or scream. They did not make their weapons for rebellion.

The Stalker throws her off easily, but Persephone has had practice and she has all the steaming, hissing, burning acidic rage inside of her that made her an exterminator.

As Saryn flies off and away, she jolts herself out of it - the Saryn unit goes limp and falls harmlessly to the floor. She sees Hades go for her frame, Mag’s legs sliding over the water slick tile as he scrambles to her.

Persephone unleashes all of her rage, all of her anger - it is like the first drop onto Earth in Saryn all over again. A release.

She pounds every single bit of energy into a single beam that blasts the Stalker straight in the chest. His sword can’t block it, his shields can’t handle it.

Can’t handle _her_.

Persephone screams, fists clenched as she forces all of the anger, all of the rage, all of the toxic fizzing feelings inside of her - fueled by the compacted murk and memories - into a beam focused on _this_.

She thinks she manages to weaken the Stalker enough, when she’s forced back into Saryn.

Mag recoils from her frame, pushing away and up, hands held out as if to ward something off.

Mag’s head swivels from Saryn to the Stalker, head shaking.

Persephone can’t help but reach out - she is still the same person.

She is still -

From the release of all that heat, all that anger, from the jostling of all those compressed memories, something glittering rattles out.

 _Kore_ , she thinks, _I’m still Kore_.

Mag runs to the cryopod, yanking the cover off with one good pull and catching the thin body inside.

And then Mag runs.

Saryn watches Mag run and draws her sword.

Persephone - _Kore_.

Kore first saw him and cut the path for him to escape. Now, for possibly the last time, Kore will cut the path behind him.

“He’s gone,” The Lotus says, what feels like hours later.

“I know,” Kore thinks.

“Are you alright, Persephone?”

 _You waste humor on the tenno_.

“Kore,” She answers. Saryn seems to nod in agreement. “I am Kore, again.”

I have risen.

-

Kore supposes - Kore, she warps the name around her fingers, in her tongue. _Kore. Kore. Kore_. She is _Kore_.

Kore supposes that it’s understandable.

She, herself, spent many rotation cycles with this newfound secret. She does not expect to see Hades - Judge - again. Especially since the Lotus must have revealed to him that she was aware of him, of who he truly was - underneath the dream.

Kore does not expect to _ever_ see Judge again. She would not blame him.

It makes her insides shrivel, wrinkled - like the rotten flesh of the Grineer. Sickly and cloying.

It isn’t fair to him, she reminds herself, for her to react this way. It is not fair of her to cling on so tightly to him when they have never been more than strangers.

But - but weren’t they? Another part of her asks this, softly, fragile and hopeful in a way that Kore does not recognize as part of herself.

This new and hopeful voice does not belong in the many black compartments of her soul.

They fought together, at each other’s backs. They were a team for so many missions -

Tyl Rigor, the many escapes of Van Hyak, the Seargent, Alad V, juggernaughts, infested invasions, hijacking, infiltrations and extractions -

For fuck’s sake she helped him get a collar for his Kubrow pup.

Kore sits in her transference chair, idly playing with her Shade’s long, dangling tendrils. Shade blows a small puff of cold air into her face and Kore huffs a silent laugh.

It is not fair of her to expect forgiveness or understanding from a stranger, even when a friendship was later built.

They had no mouths.

Well - she did.

She just never used it.

-

Archwing and underwater missions are not her favorite. She dislikes the weightlessness, the inability to feel anything solid. It’s the same feeling as being Nyx and Titania - but with Titania, at least she can stop any time.

She goes either too fast or too slow and it’s hard for her to get her bearings.

But she is an agent of the Lotus - however reluctant and ambivalent - and so this is part of her duties.

Fuck, though, if she isn’t _sick_ to her stomach. Transference is still going strong - but in this case she almost wishes it _wasn’t_.

In her ship she can feel her body reacting poorly. Her guts roil and her head begins to pound and spin and her hands are clammy. This, in turn, is not making this fight go very well.

In fact, Kore thinks as she tries to push herself through narrow corridors and blasting engines - feeling the heat as they nick her and burn through her shields - this fight is not going at all.

The simple fact of the matter is you can’t really be stealthy when you’re out here like this. There are sensors everywhere and no real places to hide effectively when you’re piloting a giant hunk of metal with a giant sword and a gun as big as your body twice over.

This fight was meant to go badly from the very beginning and Kore wishes she weren’t in so deep she couldn’t call it quits and extract.

But she _is_ in that deep and that last shot took out her left wing - she’s going to need a few moments to get it back up and going - but her momentum has her spiraling in a dizzying blur of color and stomach-churning force.

Shit, Kore thinks. Shit.

Something purple - many things purple - whiz past her but Kore can’t get herself to rights to turn and see what.

She gets tackled from behind, and if Frames could breathe - in space - the air would have been knocked from Saryn’s lungs.

The arm around her waist is in familiar colors.

A transmission breaks in - startling her, almost snapping her out of transference -

“I guess, for once, I should be the one telling you not to rush in without back up?”

Kore has never heard Hades’ voice before.

Kore, for that matter, has never _spoken_ to Hades before.

In fact, Kore has never - with her own voice - spoken to _anyone_ before, aside from the Lotus, post awakening.

It takes her a few seconds to figure out how to open her transference chamber’s coms relay to this signal and -

“ _Hades_?”

“Judge,” He replies, “For you, Judge. I mean - since you know it already.”

She grasps his wrist and squeezes. Her left wing is working again. He only lets go so she can right herself, but quickly takes her hand and starts flying in earnest.

Kore supposes that since she, herself, doesn’t really go on these sort of missions, she hasn’t seen him pilot an arching before.

He’s leagues ahead of her in that field, if nothing else.

He pulls them all the way to extraction and Kore lays down some pathetic cover fire that misses half the time, but maintains a good shield now that she isn’t trying to focus on keeping her stomach where it should be.

Hades - _Judge, Judge, Judge, Judge -_ drags them all the way to extraction. Technically it’s a failed mission, but Kore can’t bring herself to care.

He gently releases her, allowing momentum to drift her in the direction of where her orbiter is waiting. She feels her arching unit detach, leaving her weightless and motionless as she spreads her arms to lock into her retrieval unit.

Judge, through Nova, continues to look at her, hand slowly raising up - a half forgotten gesture.

Her hands are already locked into the retrieval unit.

“Bye,” Judge says, turning back to finish what she started.

Kore scrambles for the words, for the memory of actually talking - “Bye.”

She has a mouth.

And she is not a child.

-

Kore fidgets. She fidgets to the point where even Carrier - patient and dependable Carrier - can’t tolerate her moving fingers and flies away from her to hide.

“I gave him your coordinates,” The Lotus tells her. Kore picks at the border of the pink stripe down the front of her suit.

Not cream. Not green. Certainly not gold and blue.

Black, pink, gold. Ballas would have had a fucking _fit_ and she adores the image of his consternated face.

It’s one she’s slowly remembering seeing many, many times.

Those memories, as they float up from the now loose debris she had been keeping locked and chained down for so long, almost make her feel better after all the others she remembers.

“Thanks,” Kore bites out, “ _I guess_.”

“He wants to talk to you. He knows that you have been following him - helping him, protecting him.”

Kore grimaces.

“The two of you are one of my best teams,” The Lotus continues, “Would you consider trying - again?”

Kore curls her fingers together, rubbing her knuckles against each other for the feel of it.

This feels too familiar, like a lecture from a parent.

Kore chafes against the thought and discards it like hot metal. She can feel herself bristling, her frames stirring a little in storage in response - aside from Saryn who kneels next to her chair, who’s tendrils seem to freeze in place for a moment before snapping out and returning to their normal, passive waving.

“Fine,” Kore spits out.

She is not a child.

-

Judge is waiting for her, in Nova again, on a Grineer landing pad on Earth.

The outpost is empty, this she knows because a lot of newly awakened Tenno like to use it as a practice ground. Any Grineer that are here are probably in the middle of being hunted, with no room to go after two talking Frames.

His retrieval ship hovers in the distance, and when Saryn drops to Earth from Kore’s she can’t help but feel the sudden rush of _excitement_.

Earth will never not be exciting to her.

Saryn seems to respond in kind, the white tendrils of her shoulder and head flowing more energetically, undulating with pleasure.

Earth calls to her. It calls to something in her soul.

Nova raises his hand, slowly rising in the air to cross his legs and enter a meditation position. His Kubrow examines him for a moment before trotting off to investigate their surroundings.

She tilts her head and dismisses her own Kavat, who jumps onto some stacked and abandoned cargo boxes, curls up, and pretends to sleep.

Kore mimics Judge’s pose, and she feels a soft _tap_ of Judge requesting a com line.

She opens it, reluctantly.

“Hello,” Judge’s voice is soft, like he’s talking to an animal that’s going to spook.

“Hi,” Kore replies, voice rough with disuse and wariness.

“I - I wanted to thank you. Properly, I mean. For everything. I never got to before - you know, no. Ah. Mouth.”

Kore grimaces.

“It was you the entire time, wasn’t it?” Judge continues, hesitation and uncertainty in his voice. “I mean - I recognize your Saryn. You were the one who helped me when I first came out of stasis. But it was - it was you those other times, wasn’t it? Watching my back, cutting the alarms off?”

“Yes.”

Judge is quiet for a heart-pounding moment.

When he speaks again, there’s a soft smile in his voice, “I knew I wasn’t wrong. I recognized you. I just - I just didn’t believe you would do that. For me, I mean. Help me so much.”

Kore’s breath hitches with surprise, “You - remember me?”

“You were one of the Untouchables,” Judge says, voice excited, “I remember you because you were one of the Untouchables. You had - you had this hair. Pink, pink hair - pale pink. Not like, not like my Nova’s pink and purple, but a sweeter pink. It took me a while to remember, afterwards, but I did. Kore, I remember you.”

She thinks her breath must be audible -

“Untouchables?” She croaks out. This is not a memory she has had yet.

Judge backtracks, “Yes - I - that’s what I called you. Privately, in my head. I forgot, I mean - it’s been so long since I - since any of us - since any of us have been _not_ in our own heads. Does that make sense? I - on the Zariman. Do you remember what it was like? How we all kind of just - sectioned ourselves off and made these castes?”

His voice is excited and eager, but also bitter as he pushes out those last few words.

“Yes,” Kore answers.

“There was this group - they weren’t the ones in charge, the ones with power, and they weren’t the ones who were always getting picked on. They were kind of just - just there? Like the ones in charge ignored them, all of us kind of ignored them and they just _watched_ not really doing anything. I used to - I used to hate them.”

Kore flinches and Saryn must move a little too, because Nova reaches out, fingers touching against her knee.

“It was - it was how easy it was for you, for them. Like nothing could hurt you. Like you weren’t afraid or sad or angry or anything. Nothing could reach you. I kind of envied it. I was always scared. I always felt like I was running too hot. And then - then later, when they were experimenting, I was. I was volatile. I remembered thinking that maybe if I were more like an Untouchable, it wouldn’t hurt so much.”

Kore admits that what he says is partially true.

She did not allow anything to reach her. The world and the war, for the most part, skimmed past her with minimal scarring.

“I remember we partnered once - I was, I was a Mag? I don’t think you were a Saryn.”

“No,” She says, because she remembers too. Not yet.

“I remembered you and I thought - I thought that it was really amazing. You survived. I knew it had to be you. It had to be Kore behind that Ember. It was - it was just something about you. I recognized it. Your soul, maybe.”

Kore’s hands curl into fists, her skin feels too tight.

“Do you remember - before we overthrew the Orokin? Just before? You were standing with with the other Saryn units. You are one of Ballas’ Saryns.”

Kore and Saryn both stiffen at this, bristling.

“ _I am Kore_ ,” She hisses out, “I belong to _no one_.”

“Sorry - I just meant - I - “

She knows what he meant.

“We were never Ballas’ _anything_ ,” Kore says, attempting to soften her voice, “We were Ballas’ property, something to move his precious Saryns, to fuel his fight for the dead Margulis’ heart after the killed her.”

Judge is quiet, “I had heard stories about his Saryns. The way he touched them. Loved them.”

“He was not like the other Orokin,” Kore gives him, “There were Orokin that saw us at things and this is true of him. But he did not see us as things, as bodies, to be used for such purposes. We were not the same as slaves. Through us he only saw a way to reach the Margulis he betrayed. Nothing more. He did not love us. Only what our successes meant.”

“There was never an Orokin who has loved us, not even Margulis,” Judge says, startling her.

“Not even Margulis?” Kore is surprised into asking.

“No,” Judge says, “Margulis loved some of us. That is unquestionably true. But she did not truly love all of us. Not really. After all - she never saw us as anything but _children_.”

The memory curls within her, and her response slips out half-consciously, “We are not children.”

“No,” Judge agrees. “We are not.”

They both fall quiet.

“I remember you. I wanted to say - I remembered you, then, just before, too. I remembered seeing you up there. And - you were beautiful,” Judge says, “And I’m - I’m thankful for all that you’ve done for me. This - this dream has taken me some time to getting used to. But overall - overall I’m glad I got to meet you again.”

“I remembered you, too,” Kore says when the silence begins to chip away at her. “Before my own name, before my own truth - I remembered you. Judge. The fool who fights.”

“That much, I don’t think, has changed,” Judge muses.

“No,” Kore snorts, “That has not changed.”

Nova slowly extends a hand, “Hello, Kore. It’s nice to finally meet you.”

Saryn takes the hand, “Hello, Judge.”

Heat blooms in her. Fizz-cola.

-

She does not offer to meet him, face to face. Nor does he offer her, either.

She wonders how the Void changed him. How the Orokin modified him.

Kore, now, knows that the Void had changed her eyes, splayed blue-green ridges across her face and underneath her eyes - almost like the ivy and grass in the breeze of Earth. She understands now, in hindsight, why the handlers dubbed her Persephone.

She does look like a daughter of spring.

But there are no seasons in space. There is only the unrelenting dead.

Kore is curious as to how his call sign became Hades, but she does not ask.

His orbiter is a familiar sight from her dispatch front windows. Sometimes she waves and pretends that he’s there, waving back.

For all that he still hasn’t learned to check his back, and to not rush in at every moment, it is good to fight with him again.

“I don’t have to check my back,” Judge tells her, laughing as they race across Corpus walls, “You always had it for me. I got used to it.”

Kore clicks her tongue, “No wonder your frames always look so trashed whenever I come back from solo dispatches.”

-

Now that Judge has the memories of the body beyond the dream, whatever it was that was hindering him - training wise - seems to resolve itself. He doesn’t quite get ahead of her, per se, but he does somewhat catch up to her. Or at least, he catches up to _himself_.

Judge has a habit of calling her for help long after he’s in over his head, but at least he’s figure out how to be sensible about most of it.

That is not the case with this one.

“I do not want to be here,” Kore says as they circle this strange Grineer outpost. “Judge, we should turn back. We should get more help.”

“We don’t need more help,” Judge says. As always, his concern for others gets in the way. As well as his sheer stubborn pig-headedness. They don’t even _like_ Teshin.

“We need reinforcements.”

“That would take too long,” Judge says.

“Judge we can’t do this, I _do not want to do this_.” Kore can’t stress that enough. Everything about this - Teshin, the Grineer, that tenno body, all of it. It’s setting her off, every single instinct and internal alarm. It’s like when that handler - who looked at their bodies like bodies, who looked at them and thought to touch, the one Kore-Persephone struck out at first before he could even _try_ \- came to her unit when she was an Ember. But hundreds times worse.

She can’t go. The thought stops her cold.

It is not an opinion. It is a _truth_.

Whatever is here, she is not ready to handle.

She cannot help. She cannot do this. Her gut, her _soul_ screams this truth at her.

“Fine,” Judge says, flippant but angry underneath, “I don’t need you to do this. I’ll go myself. Stay here. Leave.”

Just as he flips coms off she hears him mutter, like a curse, _Untouchable_.

Kore flinches hard, but does not go after him.

He’s said that word before, his word. When he’s annoyed with her - sometimes when she’s done something truly spectacular and he’s awestruck. Under his breath like an exclamation or unconscious sigh of relief.

Kore curls up in her transference chamber, and two of her Kubrow pad over, sensing her distress from where they had been tussling by the door.

They rest their heads on her lap, pushing at each other to fit. She curls over them.

She is what she is.

There is no one who can change that.

-

She has Judge’s biometrics and stats linked directly to her ship.

She sees it when he goes dark.

Kore cannot go onto that base. Her _everything_ tells her this.

Kore cannot lose Judge. Her soul _knows_ this.

Parts of her must give under this conflict.

She is what she is.

And the fact of the matter is - Kore is what she is because she has held on so tightly to Judge. There is no reason to change that now.

Kore pushes into Saryn and _dives_.

It’s Lua all over again, except this time everything is unfamiliar and strange - twisted and wrong. Too alive. Too close to her own memories.

The Grineer here might as well be her fellow Tenno in their patrols and their ornate red braided uniforms.

Everything she sees - their technology is advanced, the buildings here are almost _beautiful_ \- pushes her more and more on edge. Uneasy.

Kore, as always, is too late, and stumbles into what looks like a three way tableau.

And Judge - _Judge?_

Kore has a moment of looking into violet eyes - off set by the red lights of the room, dark skin, and a shock of blue-violet hair -

“ _Kore no_ \- “ Judge yells - his body. How is it _here_?

Kore looks up and sees red.

-

“Come on,” Judge’s voice whispers to her, and she feels herself stirring, feels herself slowly coming back. “C’mon. You’re here. You’re okay. It was a dream. It was a dream, Kore. C’mon. Come back to me.”

Static, at first, as she tries to activate her coms. She slowly sits up, feeling strange, confused, odd.

“Judge?” She says through transmission.

“Yeah,” Judge’s face breaks into a relieved smile, “That’s my Untouchable.”

The word, this time, is not a curse.

“We have to go, Kore,” Judge says, palm against her face - Saryn’s face, and he pulls her up, she watches him _step into_ his Nova. And then his voice is back through transmission - “We have to get out of here. We don’t have much time.”

“The - The Queens?” Her mind is sluggish, like she’s been spun around a few thousand times and everything is just settling back into place now.

“Taken care of,” Judge says as they run - Teshin close behind them.

“That was a dream?” Kore confirms, to have it said, to be certain.

“Yes.”

She wonders if they had the same dream.

“I am not a slave,” Kore says, hotly, raw and fizzing at the edges.

Judge’s voice has the smallest uptick of a laugh, though the rest of it is dark and bitter, “No, Kore. You are not a slave.”

“No one bought me.”

“No.”

Kore thinks long and hard as they fight towards extraction.

“I did what I had to.”

“I believe you.”

Kore whispers, “I became what I had to. I chose _. They did not make me. I make me_.”

Judge pauses, and perhaps this is where their lives part. Nova looks at her and then nods, solemnly.

“I understand.”

“I hunted,” Kore whispers, half hoping he can’t hear her, “I _refuse_ to be the shaking animal, caught.”

Judge’s voice is very soft, and he reaches out, touching her shoulder.

“Untouchable,” He says, and then he runs towards the retrieval ships.

-

“I am Kore,” She says to him, as they make their escape through the stars. The Void that birthed them. “And I am everything I made myself to be.”

I know the things that I have done.

“Teshin killed the Queen,” Judge says. “My call sign is Hades. I destroyed everything with my powers from the Void. Everyone. I know what it means - what it means to be a Tenno.”

“We were children, before,” Kore says. “We were not Tenno, yet. Not on the Zariman.”

Not where she learned to cut her teeth. Not where she learned how to cut flesh.

Not where she learned to cut ties.

“No, we were nameless beasts, then,” Judge says. “Kore. I commanded Teshin to kill the Queen. I controlled him.”

Kore turns her head in the direction she knows Judge’s ship is flying.

“I’m sorry about what I said before, Kore.”

Kore, personally, would have killed the Queen with her own hands. She is not sure if this makes her a better or worse person.

The thought of controlling someone else - _like a Handler, a Master, a Ballas_ \- makes her stomach churn.

She has no room to cast stones.

“I know,” Kore says. Forgiving is easy.

Forgetting is the hard part.

-

They meet at the mountain pass from the dream, and Judge holds the bottle of Kuva ins his hand. His eyes meet hers.

“I gave half to Teshin,” He says. “But I think - I think that this isn’t something I can decide entirely. You were there, too.”

He waits, as if she will make her decision right then.

“Thank you,” Kore says, taking the warm Kuva in Saryn’s hand.

Judge seems to be waiting to see if she will leave Saryn. She does not. He walks away after a few minutes of stilted silence, retreating to Nova and to his ship.

She waits until she is certain he is gone before stepping out of Saryn.

It feels strange to be anywhere - to be actually anywhere, with her own body - that is not her ship.

The mountain air is a shock to her lungs that makes her remember - it makes her remember Ballas’ cells. The air, there, was not recycled.

When she looks into the horizon she has to squint a little. The sun actually hurts her eyes.

Saryn hands her the Kuva.

It’s heavy.

The wind all around her feels cold, solid. She feels - she feels vulnerable and raw.

“I am _Kore_ ,” She says, and raises the Kuva to her mouth, eyeing the black of it like it’s looking back at her. “ _You do not control me.”_

_-_

Judge comes out of his frame _all the damn time_. It drives her crazy.

Kore does not.

She can tell that this is driving _him_ crazy.

“Are you mad at me?” He caves, one day, Judge’s hand grabs at hers, firm and unafraid of the fact that her Ember is currently on fire.

She quickly cuts the flames off and hopes that she’s conveying an appropriate amount of incredulity in the way Ember looks at him.

They’re doing this _here? Right now? Right in the middle of a fight?_

“I’m about to be,” Kore snaps through the transmission and shakes him off, angrily hurling a ball of flame at some explosive tanks of gas.

The resulting explosion only mollifies her a little bit.

Judge has either the common sense or a sense of preservation that keeps him from asking for the rest of the mission on Mars, and even for a few missions around Jupiter.

“You don’t leave your ship or your frames,” Judge says without preamble as soon as she’s answered her com.

Kore is in the middle of examining what appears to be infested growths on her ship. Ordis can’t tell if there’s anything wrong - everything seems normal.

“So?” Kore says, watching as her Kavat bats at the infested tendrils. They’re similar to infested growth, but not quite the same. She rubs her Kavat’s long ear between her fingers and sends her off to curl up somewhere - probably - very intrusive.

“Why?” Judge asks. She can image the way he’s boggling at even having to ask.

“Why should I?” Kore returns.

In truth - Kore is - _uncomfortable_ with the idea of being so vulnerable. So exposed.

She is a Tenno. She is a Void Beast.

But she has lived and shaped herself to be the soul within her frames. She is infinitely more comfortable, at home, in Saryn and all the others than as herself. Even in Rhino she feels a small level of security she doesn’t feel if she dared to leave her ship in her own skin.

Kore knows that she is small and vulnerable. Kore knows what she is capable of.

Kore also knows the truth of what has been done to her.

She does not like to be touched.

Too many things in this world have touched her already.

Kore cuts the communication link before he can try to argue with her.

-

“Operator, we’re being boarded!” Ordis’ voice cracks and goes shrill.

Kore jolts up, and feels her frames stirring to action in the armory.

“Stalker?”

“No! Another Operator!” Ordis says, and she can’t tell if it’s excitement or irritation that makes his voice glitch out again.

“ _Kore_ ,” Judge says through the coms, “Stop being so stubborn.”

Kore grinds her teeth and curses him.

“You’re the one boarding _my_ ship,” She snaps, scrambling down from where she was sitting, held up, in Oberon’s arm and examining the strange pink cyst she found on his neck. Oberon lurches after her, legs matching her pace as she hurries to the transference room.

“You’re the one avoiding _me!_ ”

The door across from what she’s now learned to be Helminth’s room slides open and Judge pauses as she stares at him. Oberon raises a hand over her, as if to shield her.

Judge stops entirely, and from the look on his face she can tell that he obviously hasn't thought this through.

Kore glares at him, and it feels like she’s hot all over. Angry and embarrassed.

Her fists open and close.

For a fleeting second, she wonders how good he is at getting up after being hit he is when _she’s_ the one doing the hitting.

Judge’s brain is visibly tripping over itself trying to figure out where to go from here.

As they say, the fool rushes in.

“I am going to count to ten,” Kore says, voice remarkably level, “And by the time I’m at ten, you better be off my fucking ship.”

Judge’s blank face continues to look at her.

“ _Ten_ ,” Kore snaps - and she is suddenly aware of the fact that not only have her Kubrow, Kavats, and Sentinels swarmed behind her, but also some of her frames have managed to climb out of storage - one by one - and are advancing.

Judge scrambles back on his heels, the doors sliding shut behind him and Kore screams - a burst of anger that she has to reign in as she storms to her transference chair.

She doesn’t need it anymore, but it still makes her feel safe.

-

Judge has the decency to look ashamed of himself when he next hails her.

This time, she permits herself to also be seen on the video feed.

“I’m sorry. I broke boundaries and it was incredibly senseless of me,” He says. And then, looking at her from where he’d been sort of looking off to the side, he recoils - “ _What is that?”_

Kore looks him dead in the eye and _licks_ the piece of infested she snuck away from Helminth.

Judge looks horrified.

Kore’s smile is more a baring of her teeth.

“The next time you board my ship without my permission, I am going to release my newly found Charger on you.” Kore raises a finger and uses it to swipe the holographic projection towards her incubator, where a small lump of vaguely quadrupedal flesh is - for the lack of a better word - _gestating_.

Judge’s sound of disgust and terror pleases her enough that she turns the screen back to herself.

“I forgive you. This time. Call me when you’re ready to talk while respecting boundaries.”

-

Kore does not wait for this to happen.

Kore does not wait for things to happen to her. Kore acts. Kore hunts.

Kore chooses.

So, borrowing a page from Judge’s book, she takes over his ship.

Judge looks terrified as she walks towards him - on her own legs - with her Saryn and her new Helminth Charger trailing behind her.

Judge looks from Saryn to Charger to Kore and Kore smiles beatifically.

Judge’s Kavat’s ears are pinned back as it hisses at them.

“Go away, Ugly,” Kore says and the Kavat - remarkably - decides to listen to her, scampering off.

Judge looks at it, helpless, “ _I raised you_.”

Kore doesn’t stop advancing until she has Judge against a wall. He’s taller than her, but she has the advantage of being _Kore_ who _uses her head_.

“Judge,” She says, tasting out his name on her mouth.

Judge swallows and looks ready to be slugged.

If she were going to slug him, she would have done it when she had a better reach and a good lead up for momentum.

“The reason I do not leave my frame is because when I’m in my frame I am generally bigger, badder, and better than anyone else that tries to fuck with me,” Kore says. And then softly, very softly so only he can hear her - no cephalons, unless they’re really listening in, or whatever - “I do not like to be touched.”

Kore then rests her head on his shoulder, face turned away from him as she leans against his body.

Warframes do not feel like what she remembers other bodies feel like. Kavats and Kubrows are not quite the same.

Kore closes her eyes, and forces her heart to calm down. Forces the steam to settle.

Judge’s hands are hovering over her back - uncertain and confused by the definite contradiction of her words and actions.

Kore stomps on his foot and steps back when Judge lets out a high yelp and crumples, eyes watering.

Kore looks down at him, her arms folded.

Judge looks up at her, confusion all over his face as he bites his lip.

Kore nods, more to herself than to him and then crouches so that they’re eye level.

She examines his face, up close.

She isn’t sure, exactly, what he looked like before the Void. She’s certain that his eyes must have been a different color, and that the somatic scarring wouldn’t have been there.

Judge’s eyes flick over her face and his mouth parts, just a little.

“Kore,” He whispers, a lop sided smile growing on his lips, “Kore.”

Kore reaches out and touches the gold at his chin with the tip of her finger.

“Fool,” She mutters and his smile blooms into a full grin, seeming to bask in her. “Fool,” She repeats, and then, reluctantly, “ _My_ fool.”

Judge laughs, pushing his shin against her finger, “You never let me learn any better.”

Kore clicks her tongue and Judge raises his hand. She stiffens, wary - but he slowly runs his hand through her hair, marveling at the pale pink strands.

“Spring in space,” He laughs, “Kore. My Untouchable spring in space.”

“Fool, there are no seasons in space,” She says, pressing her nail to the gold metal as he laughs at her hair. “And I can’t be untouchable if you’re touching me right now.”

Judge abruptly sobers, hand falling, “I am sorry, Kore. For all of it. For making you come after me - for what I said. And for bursting in on you, before. When you didn’t want to talk.”

“Hm,” Kore lowers her hand. She considers it for a very long moment, she considers her choices.

Kore does not like to be touched.

Kore, unfortunately, likes Judge very much.

Judge, the fool, likes to poke at things. Judge likes to touch things he should know better than to be messing with.

Security access panels, explosives, poisonous plants - among other things. Usually with his own Tenno body instead of a frame that can actually be repaired. This, she thinks, is because - well.

They’ve been locked into pods for over a hundred years and most of the touching they’ve done since waking - with their Tenno hands - involves synthetic materials on a talking ship. It is, regrettably, understandable.

Kore just so happens to be better at weighing her own self preservation higher than curiosity over new tactile senses since it seems to be common sense.

Judge has missed this memo. As usual.

Kore leans into his hand and closes her eyes with a sigh.

“This,” She says, “Is not an open invitation.”

Judge’s hand slowly, cautiously, runs through her hair.

“I do not like to be touched,” Kore says, “Unless I choose it. Unless I say _yes_.”

“That’s more than reasonable.”

Kore swallows no small amount of pride.

“I do not like it when you are sad.”

Judge’s hand stills.

Kore frowns, keeping her eyes closed.

“I can get used to you touching me. I refuse to get used to you being sad.”

“Thank you,” Judge says, quietly, voice a little rough. She opens her eyes and sees that his are wet. Kore is stunned. She hadn’t meant to - to make him _cry_. “I just - it’s. You’re real too.”

Kore’s throat tightens as Judge says that.

She feels everything he can’t say because his throat’s closed up as he’s crying like the child he isn’t. Hasn’t been in years.

“I’m real,” She promises, reaching her hand up to squeeze his wrist. “I am here. So are you. We aren’t asleep. This is not a dream.”

Judge’s fingertips tremble against her skin as he crumples forward. Kore catches him in her arms as he squeezes her tight, shaking. Sobbing.

“It’s real,” He repeats. “It’s real.”

Kore runs her hand up and down his back. Broader than hers, but not by much.

She can feel herself rapidly building up to something like _overload_. His breath, the dampness of his tears, the way his body shakes - is _warm_ \- and the recycled air on the back of her neck, all of it -

Kore fists her hands into the back of his suit and buries her face into his neck, screwing her eyes shut.

“I am Kore and I am real,” She whispers through her tightening throat for them both. “You are Judge and you are real. We are both awake. I operate a Saryn made in the style of the Orokin. I was a Saryn commanded by Ballas. My call sign during the war was Persephone.”

Judge’s breathing evens with hers, not quite right, but closer to not crying as she tries to pull them both on track.

“I operate a Nova,” Judge whispers, voice hoarse, “I was a Mag under the Orokin. I had no single Master. My call sign during the war was Hades. I was held for experimentation for over half the war. I was never assigned a permanent unit.”

“The Void changed me,” Kore continues, “I have pink hair. I have blue and green scars on my face.”

“Spring in space,” Judge murmurs, body loosening as he sags against her, arms carefully wrapping around her back instead of clinging.

“No seasons in space,” She says back.

“So you don’t have to go nowhere, if there are no seasons in space,” Judge muses. “Like in the Old Earth myth.”

_“We call her Persephone. She came back after two seasons.”_

“No,” Kore replies, “I don’t.”

They are not children.

They do have mouths.

“I won’t go,” Kore says, forcing herself to brand them into herself and Judge, both. “I will not leave you behind.”

“I’m the one who should be saying that,” Judge replies. “I won’t leave you, behind, either.”

Kore blooms hot, fizz-cola but all over the underside of her skin. Her soul.

“Fool,” She chokes out, Judge cups the back of her head, stroking down her short hair. She can feel him swallow, and then laugh.

“Your fool.”

“My Fool,” She concedes.

“My Untouchable.”


End file.
